‘Through thick and Thin’
Alex and I both know the feeling of loss and grief only too well. We also know this is one of the twists in the journey of life, just as our vows reminded us last year through the good times and bad, through thick and thin 💔
Initially this was something we were going to deal with totally private at home. Very much like the past few months. But actually like any of my blogs I’ve written, my long winded social media status’s – it’s actually like a mental release for me. A diary that I’ve made public.
As a lot of our life is on social media, we often share a lot of positivity because that’s how we choose to live a day to day ‘glass always half full not empty’ attitude but we are always authentic, real and honest and sometimes reality isn’t always the good. I don’t want any sympathy from this, it’s not my reason for this post, it’s purely to raise awareness and to help other women that may read this that have gone through the same. It’s also so we don’t have to have the same distressing conversations time and time again.
I’m also well aware that many people will go through this time and time again and we are incredibly blessed with two children already, but it doesn’t make it any easier in this moment.
‘Breaking a taboo’
The things women have to go through in silence, and then carry on life as if nothing has happened. Some may find this upsetting, some may wonder why I’m speaking out. But now that this is something I myself have experienced and that we are dealing with, we know this topic just isn’t being spoken about, or at least not enough. The first thing I did was want to hear REAL Women’s stories about why this could of happened and what to expect next. There is a total lack of sharing, speaking and honesty. So if I can reach one other woman that is going through this now and offer some relief or comfort that I too am going through this, it forms a community of sharing. Sharing the heartache and sorrow, but also sharing that its ‘okay’ to speak out. This isn’t something you have to hide and pretend isn’t happening.
Being totally off the radar for most of this year, business wise and socially has led to us both receiving a crazy amount of messages checking we are both okay, wondering what is going on. Which is lovely that so many people cared enough to ask; and often said they were missing our social media posts and seeing stories of what we all get up to.
I can now let everyone know that the reason I fell off the face of the planet was because earlier this year in February we were over joyed to find out that we were expecting much wanted baby Salter number 3. It is no secret that we have wanted to add to our family for a while but in 2018 we had our wedding so decided to wait. We were overjoyed to know that 2019 was the year our family was getting bigger.
Almost immediately I became very poorly with acute sickness – not ‘morning’ sickness like your told. This was all day and often night sickness – up to sometimes 30 times a day of being sick or literally over the toilet wanting to be sick with extreme nausea. I suffered nausea, what I thought was fairly badly with my pregnancy with jeorgie, but this was a whole other level. It totally wiped me out and I was physically unable to move most days. Alex totally had no choice but to take over the role of Mummy and Daddy and I would get up and help where I could which wasn’t very often. As a lot of you know I’m a busy person at the best of times, I don’t sit down, whether I’m working, doing stuff round the house, cooking, with my bubba’s or whatever it may be, I literally don’t stop. So I found it really hard to be out of action; but reminded myself how lucky I was to be dealing with the sickness and be blessed with this pregnancy.
‘Sickness’
During this time I found a real lack of openness and understanding around this type of sickness. Like real knock you side ways sickness. My whole mouth was cracked and blistered from not drinking enough, and being sick, my lips were bleeding, I was as white as anything. My sense of smell had gone into over drive meaning anything could tip me over the edge and I would need to lie down, or throw up.
As you will know, a lot of my business is either on social media – photos, stories, using products, talking, OR face to face meetings, trainings and so forth. I couldn’t do anything because I was in such a state and of course we DONT speak about our growing miracles until we are deemed safe at that all important 12 week mark. This is tradition isn’t it?! The past few months has made me question tradition….
I mean what do you say when your so poorly, you can’t do anything? if you can’t tell people what’s really going on as we are told not to?! The more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve found the whole subject baffling because what if you just can’t carry on with the everyday?
In all honestly unless you’ve been through this kind of sickness I don’t think you understand it. But if you know someone going through this, then know that it’s TOUGH, it’s not exaggerated, it’s real and it can last a long time. Luckily I’ve had some truly amazing people around me that have checked in, sent little care packages, and made sure we had enough help with Jenson and jeorgie. Of course, I can’t thank Alex enough for totally taking caring of not only Jenson, Jeorgie and me, but literally everything from the early mornings to the late nights and everything in between.
Because I was so sick, I had 2 early scans. Firstly because i thought their must be twins being this ill! But also for peace of mind. The first time we saw a little jelly bean with a heart beat, and the second time a properly formed little bubba with a strong heart beat moving around with the arms and legs forming. During the 2nd scan I was past 10 weeks and was told the chances of anything going wrong after that point dramatically decreases to a very low percentage which was reassuring.
Along with acute sickness and the usual pregnancy effects, I was quickly sporting a rather big bump. After 2 babies and probably not a great deal of muscle memory, my bump popped out very quick. It’s been hidden on the rare occasions I’ve been out in public under baggy shirts, but on our recent holiday to Tenerife in a swim suit it was hard to hide so I decided to embrace the bump. After all, I was only a week off the ‘safe’ mark of 12 weeks. We had taken many photos of bump already, to document the pregnancy like we had previously with Jenson and Jeorgie and we were so excited to be able to properly tell the children this week.
When you have a bump I think you automatically can’t help sitting with your hands on the bump, giving it a little rub and you start to fall in love with your little baby you haven’t met yet. It’s a natural instinct.
On the morning of our scan at the 3 month mark, I was being sick as usual but we were super excited to see little baby again and to finally be able to share our news. As I laid on the bed, the sonographer got the image of the baby up on the screen and instantly I couldn’t see the heart beat. She moved the scan around – and then the words came ‘I’m really sorry to say, the heart beat isn’t there’ – HOW CAN THAT BE?! I have a bump, I’m still being sick… In a matter of seconds the excitement of the past few months came crashing down and I just burst into floods of tears.
‘Miscarriage’
When you hear someone has had a miscarriage, you assume their has been some signs, some sort of warning, some bleeding or spotting. Maybe giving you have a reason to think something is wrong. But no, there is also such a thing as a SILENT miscarriage or the technical term which was stated on the form we were given to leave with a ‘Missed Miscarriage’. A cruel trick your body plays to make you think your still pregnant but in fact your little heart beat has stopped 💔
There is very little information online about this kind of miscarriage – 1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage, and 1% of these are missed or silent. Another reason for me to speak out. When something happens, I think with technology nowadays, most peoples reaction is to reach to google. However this isn’t usually the best idea and for anyone going through the same, I would recommend ONLY looking at the official miscarriage association website, an official organisation that has true facts, and also real women’s stories – although very few are actually on silent miscarriage still, you will find some there.
‘Choosing the right option for you & your body’
After a silent miscarriage you have 3 options – to see what your body will do naturally. I’ve been told by a doctor as the pregnancy hormone is so high within me it could be another month before anything happens and my body will carry on ‘acting’ pregnant and then possibly another 3 weeks for my body to ’empty’
This was just not an option for me, especially with still being sick daily.
As much as we didn’t want to let this baby go, my body wasn’t letting it go, and it obviously wasn’t ready to let us go either 💔
Option two is to be induced by medication which again could happen at any point after, and option three is a surgical procedure. I won’t go into the details but you can pretty much guess what happens in both. We decided to go for option 3 and made what we felt was the best decision for us, we both felt this was best for not only me to deal with physically but also both of us mentally and emotionally.
From making a decision on option 3 it was then a case of where could we get it done and for me it was a case of the sooner the better. I rang around a few hospitals and the earliest I was told it would be is the following week, this just felt like a lifetime away so I kept persisting. Finally I managed to speak to a lady who understood how upset I was and she got me an appointment for 2 days time and said they had availability for the surgery 4 days after that. This was as good as I was going to get so I took it.
‘The process’
At the assessment they said that because of the nature of my condition they could actually get me in the following day which was of course even better. I was told to be nil by mouth and return in the morning. As I sat gowned up ready to go to theatre, we were told there was an emergency in so we might have a bit of a wait. 6 hours later we were told that another lady had come in that really needed surgery and as much as I was an emergency, this lady was worse off. Of course, even though I had prepared myself psychologically, this is a reminder that there usually is someone worse off than you, it got to the end of the day and the doctor told me the news that I was dreading as the hours passed that I wouldn’t be seen today so to get dressed and go home with instructions to go nill by mouth again, and to come back the next morning at 7.30am.
The following day came around and we were back as instructed for 7.30am it took a further 3hrs to be seen by the doctor who this time informed me that even more priority cases had emerged that put me further down the list. I was taken to a ward and told I had to remain nil by mouth and wouldn’t be taken through to surgery until 6pm at the earliest. Luckily thanks to family and friends we managed to arrange childcare for both days so that Alex could stay by my side throughout. I had spent the past few days since we had the scan trying to occupy my time and my mind as much as possible and was then confined to a bed for pretty much 48hrs which was hard.
Again the hours passed, as did 6pm, and the pressure was building that I would again be told to go home. Finally at 7pm almost 12 hours since we first arrived and after having one meal and drink in almost 48hrs I was called to theatre.
The nurses that collected me in my bed to take me down were extremely compassionate and kind, so much so that I actually broke down in floods of tears, it had been an intense and emotional 2 days (few days) and I guess there was some relief in there too that I was actually finally being seen.
‘Aftercare’
I cannot fault the care we have received which included being given options for a funeral if we chose, further medical testing, and also counselling. The ladies have been amazingly caring, sympathetic and non judgmental. Any length of wait for this kind of thing is painfully difficult and I know that I’ve been lucky in a sense because I happened to speak to someone on the phone that got me in straight the way. We have just had to play the waiting game which seemed like forever but then this could of also been another week or more down the line going through the same thing at another hospital. Every time the curtain opened or you heard the doctors voice I was hoping it was because I was next to be seen. They are so overworked and I’m sure underpaid for what they actually do. I have to say that the next time someone wants to bash the NHS, I personally feel we are SO lucky to have this service for us when something happens like this completely out of the blue.
And just like that, in the blur of coming round in recovery, you go from your body being ‘pregnant’ to not. Going home punctured from blood tests and cannula’s, bruised, bleeding not just physically but emotionally. Back empty and at a loss of what to do next. Do you carry on the dream of baby number 3, or is this us being told we were selfish for wanting a third healthy, happy baby when we’ve already got 2 and to be happy with what we’ve got?! Or do you risk the heart ache, and the danger again? Always wondering if on that next scan your heart beat with be there 💔 We don’t have an answer for any of those questions yet as this is still so raw but I guess time will tell as to how we feel in the future.
Never quite knowing if it’s something you did wrong, did you fail in some way. As someone that does everything by the ‘book’ I’ve wracked my brains thinking where I went wrong and if I could of done anything differently. Never knowing if you should stay silent or speak out. But in an age where mental health is everywhere, a world where anxiety is a term often used, then is it damaging for women not to speak out, to be able to share and get some relief, to be able to off load mentally?! Not only for women, but also for the other parents, who’s not only going through the physical side of pregnancy sickness or heaven forbid, miscarriage, but the mental side and seeing their partner or wife go through the physical distress. This is why I have written this….
For all the women that are going through a distressing time but feel they can’t speak out because it’s not the ‘done thing’ I have chosen to speak out and hope that it can maybe helps someone in some way ❤️
Now only time will tell for us. It’s time to rest, recharge, heal both physically and mentally and count our blessings….
Em xx
BUT…living abroad in the heat means that once 11am hits, it almost becomes unbearable to be outside. So we found we adopted the Spanish way of life of being indoors at these strong peaks of sunshine.
Our Spanish adventure has taught me so much about a different culture, language, me as a person and about our family. We are truly grateful for the experiences we’ve had, the friendships we’ve made and to be able to give our children this incredible summer.
We chose Rebecca Claire photography, through recommendation. I immediately fell in love with her style of images and knew she would be perfect for our day. We have not been disappointed. We are totally blown away by the work provided. In fact, some of the photos, I didn’t even know she was there, and moments have been captured so beautifully. Not just of us, our children and our guests. Looking at our wedding portfolio of 800 edited photos, was like reliving the day.
So a little heads up – it takes AGES to get ready on your wedding day! Typically I get ready really quick for a night out, I have two children so don’t have time anymore to spend hours getting ready. Luckily my hairdresser and make up artist had pre-scheduled everything. They knew who was having hair and make up done at exactly what time. Which meant the day just ‘flowed’
If like me, you don’t want to take up your precious wedding time – get organised and planned with the timings of your day. It will make you feel totally relaxed before you arrive. There was not one second of flapping or stress on the day – and I put it totally down to having the best glam squad I could of imagined. Thank you Joanne and Emily!
My dress came beautifully boxed and ready for travel from the amazing Nobel and Wright Atalier. I highly recommend all brides to get their dress boxed including their veil. Also make sure you have been talked through how to repack it to bring it back as there is a ‘knack’ to how the boxes are closed and tied for you to carry it with ease.
She also steamed my our dressing gowns for getting ready, my silk pjs, the grooms suit and a few other bits and pieces. Some we pre booked, some we sprung on her last minute and she was more than accommodating.
Biggest tip of all – when you arrive at your ceremony – take it all in, as that moment you walk down the aisle is over in a flash and you’ll want to do it over and over again. So let any stress you may be feeling go away, don’t worry about how anything looks, or whether things are in the right place, or whether a family member is getting on with who they are sat next to – none of that matters on the day. This is your special moment to enjoy and I can hand on heart say I let any of my pre stresses go and soaked up every moment from getting ready with my special girls and my mum, through to the special moment when I headed towards my husband, right through until the very end of the night. Everything else in that moment was irrelevant.
